This is part of a series of explorations for an AU-Tony still becomes Iron Man, Thor still eventually gets a hammer, the Avengers still get together. In the center of the whole mess, Loki is the variable that keeps changing everything.
There is one other fic in this series so far, called Fractals. You can read it over here: s/8493909/1/Fractals
Fibonacci numbers are some of my favourite, and I'm particularly partial to their spirals. You don't actually need to know anything about them to enjoy the fic.
Warnings: none
Not Thorki, just bro-feels :3
Sequences
Thor has never been very clever.
His parents tell him he is, as do his teachers. Many people tell him he is. He supposes it is in the definition of the word, and that they most likely mean that he is intelligent, which he will not argue. Thor can reel off twenty to thirty different synonyms for words, knows the dates for bits of history no one else cares to know, and there are very few things he cannot sort out given he has the interest and time to do so. People praise him for it.
But Thor knows that he is not clever.
Clever is quickness, speed, wit, and Thor speaks slowly, carefully, composes and writes the words in his head before he speaks them (when he remembers, when his temper does not best him and he finds himself using his strength instead). Thor might know the particular definition and degree of intelligence that the word 'clever' means, but he knows that it is not his definition.
Thor is slow, plodding, grounded, except when he is angry, which he is quick to leap to, especially when it concerns his brother and suggestions that Loki is in any way not genius and fire and wit.
Thor knew before everyone else that Loki was the very definition of clever.
XXXXXX
They are eight and four, respectively.
They are outside, Loki digging in the dirt, Thor sitting next to him. He is not helping; he is watching his little brother from time to time while he idly thumbs through the colouring book that was shoved into his hands. Though small, Loki's fingers are quick, and there is a look of single-minded concentration on his face. Thor knows that when he was four, he was spilling words everywhere—he does not remember a time that he has not enjoyed talking, has heard jokes about how he arrived talking, and hears whispers of family now, casting worried glances at Loki.
Loki does not spill any words, not even a trickle.
He seems to understand them—when they are simple words, like 'sit here, Loki' or 'eat up!' or his name. When they are handed to him—'here, Afi Bor got you a colouring book'—Loki always grasp them (he spent near the entire afternoon colouring, until he suddenly abandoned it and tugged on Thor's sleeve. Thor had been playing Mario Kart with cousin Baldr, and Loki cost him the race. It is okay, though, because Thor loves his brother).
But when people begin to speak longer to Loki, to coo at him as Amma Bestla does, to ask him questions about his day as Aunty Freya does, Loki's face slowly turns to a scowl the longer they speak to him. (Once, Thor came running because Loki was screaming and found that cousin Tyr was keeping Loki pinned to watch television, which Loki despises because it does not stop talking. Thor got in trouble later for breaking Tyr's wrist, but he did not care. No one torments his brother.) Mama says that Loki is simply a late bloomer; Papa says that Loki will speak when he is ready, but Thor is not blind and he is not deaf—he can see their worry and hear them discuss doctor's visits.
Loki's fingers pry up a snail shell that had been buried in the dirt, a grin breaking on his face. He runs his fingers over it, then holds it out to Thor. Thor smiles at him, sets the colouring book open in his lap, then takes the shell. He starts to brush dirt off of it; a few grains land on one of the pages that Loki had not coloured.
Loki sits on the ground next to Thor, leans against him and watches as he cleans. Loki loves spirals, is capable of drawing them over the entirety of a day if the mood takes him. (Thor tried, once, to join him, but Loki grew angry so quickly at what Thor drew that Thor stopped, wondering what he was doing wrong.) He hands the snail shell back to Loki, who smiles again, runs his fingers along the shell, follows the spiral outward.
Thor goes back to looking at the colouring book. There is something about it which he cannot place; many of the pages have been filled this afternoon already, but towards the back there are fewer pages coloured in. He feels like there is some sort of pattern to it (they are learning patterns at school, and sequences. Thor is not very good at them, though he wants to be).
Thor feels Loki tying something to his wrist and glances down, surprised; the snail shell has been cleverly wrapped in one of Loki's shoe strings, the other shoe string used to make a bracelet. (Loki is very good at knots, and sometimes single-mindedly goes through the house, tying all the strings he can find into knots, tying blind strings to each other and braiding together electrical cords; Thor still remembers the hour he spent undoing all the controller cables one afternoon.) Loki's vibrant green eyes (and no one knows where he got them, there has not been anyone with green eyes in the family for at least two generations—Amma Bestla's mother) are watching Thor's face expectantly.
"Thank you, brother" Thor tells him.
Loki grins wide, then turns his attention elsewhere.
XXXXXX
"Mama, can you look at Loki's colouring book?"
His mother looks up from her reading at Thor. Thor is sure now that he has had a chance to examine it more thoroughly that there is a pattern in the book, but he is still unsure what it is.
"Is there something wrong?" she asks him as he sits down next to her.
Thor shakes his head. If there is a pattern, then he is right and there is nothing wrong with his brother, and his parents are right that Loki is only waiting to speak.
"No, Mama. I think there is a pattern."
Mama takes the book from her son and flips through it. Thor is confident that his mother will find the pattern, if there is one—she is very good with numbers, and always helps him with his math homework. He thinks it is because she weaves (Loki will sit by her at the loom sometimes, fingers running over the threads, transfixed), and so is used to bringing patterns out of what, to Thor, is nothingness.
Papa is not home yet, though Mama has the television on already; he must be on his way. Thor watches the show that is on, wishing it were cartoons or perhaps Power Rangers. His mother is still flipping through the book, though her hands are starting to slow.
"Thor," she says.
"Yes?"
"Did you help Loki pick what drawings to colour?"
"No, Mama."
"Did anyone help?"
He shakes his head.
Mama hums, then goes back to the front of the book and begins to check the page numbers at the bottom again.
"Is there a pattern?" he asks hopefully.
"Maybe," she tells him.
Thor beams. There is. He is right. He thumbs the snail shell on the makeshift bracelet.
XXXXXX
Loki is the very definition of clever, provided people listen properly. Mama gives him a very small loom, a wide selection of yarn, and shows him how to warp the loom. Thor sits across the table, working on his English homework.
Loki selects the deep purple Mama loves, then a white, and begins to follow Mama's motions.
Thor watches as his little brother scowls and bats away Mama's hands, determined to do this himself. Carefully, Loki runs five strands purple, eight strands white, thirteen strands purple, twenty-one strands white, then starts over again at five. Always and exactly, until there are five sections. He only allows Mama to help when he fumbles with threading the heddle.
Once it is warped, Mama does not have to show Loki how to throw the weft (Loki, who sits and watches her when she is angry and weaving after fights with Thor and Odin, Loki who she never gets angry at, and sometimes, sometimes, this makes Thor jealous), only fills two shuttles for Loki-one with the same purple, another with a blue. She leaves, tells Thor to get her if Loki needs help, and goes to prepare dinner.
Loki alternates the deep purple exactly so with the midnight blue.
Thor does not much care to watch weaving, but he cannot help but watch Loki, bowed over the tiny loom. He is not used to seeing such focused intensity for so long on anything but spirals and colouring books. Thor writes down the pattern of Loki switching yarns, because he thinks perhaps his mother has a plan with this task for Loki, and it will be easier if she does not have to count the weave.
1b, 1p, 2b, 3p, 5b, 8p, 13b.
1p, 1b, 2p, 3b, 5p, 8b, 13p.
Repeat from 1b.
He looks at Loki's face, and realizes his little brother's lips are moving, counting out the rhythm.
Thor does not know if Loki is actually saying the numbers, and if he is it is far too quiet to be heard over the general rustling of the house. If he is, though, it is the first time Thor has ever seen his brother speak.
Loki works until dinner is ready and a little past. Thor leaves Mama standing patiently, waiting on Loki to stop (they have long since learned not to interrupt Loki when he is focused so single-mindedly); when he comes back, she has removed the scarf from the loom and Loki is fingering it, legs kicking idly. He grins as he sees Thor and spreads the scarf out on the table. Thor runs his fingers over it—it looks like an exactingly organized night sky.
Thor ruffles Loki's hair, returning the grin.
Later, much later, when Loki is meant to be asleep and Thor has just gone to his room, Loki appears at his doorway, scarf in hand.
"What is it, brother?" Thor asks, even though he knows Loki will not answer.
Loki tugs at the snail shell bracelet Thor has not removed yet, then offers him the scarf. It takes Thor a few moments to realize, then he digs out an old birthday present bag from under his bed, which he has been meaning to put in the box in the basement where they keep all the wrapping paper and gift bags.
They don't have any tissue, but Loki does not seem to mind. Thor writes Mama next to To:, and Loki next to From:. Loki takes the pencil from him and draws a spiral over the 'i.' For the first time, Thor realizes how very neat and exact Loki's spirals are.
XXXXXX
Loki begins speaking just before he turns five; Thor suspects that Loki has been speaking for a very long time, just not where any of them can hear, remembering Loki's lips moving as he worked on the scarf. Loki's words often stutter or grind to a halt with any interruption, and they are very soft, but they are not clumsy like two year old cousin Heimr, who has just begun to speak in full sentences.
Loki always hums just before he speaks.
Loki speaks most around Thor, though much of it is counting. Thor is not stupid, and his parents do not have to tell him that Loki's brain is wired differently for him to know. Thor is (if he is not humble) good with words—everyone tells him so; he knows that Loki's words are numbers and sequences. (He asked his math teacher about the pattern Loki kept using, and has learned since then about Fibonacci numbers and how spirals can be formed of them. It was after that he convinced Odin to get Loki a snail as a pet instead of a cat, knowing his brother would love the snail far more.) He will sometimes go to the library at lunch when he is at school and make a copy of his math work, then give Loki the other copy. Loki always grins in delight at the worksheets that used to make Thor groan; now, he finds that he understands better because he usually must explain with words to Loki what he has learned, and for Thor, words are what make sense, not numbers.
Loki rarely needs the explanations, but he always sits (not patiently; he fidgets, digs with his nails into the eraser, runs his eyes over the rest of the room, mentally counting and Thor always wonders what the world looks like through Loki's eyes) and lets Thor explain.
Thor is grateful. Thor knows he is not clever, that he is merely intelligent, merely good with words and too stubborn to give up.
Loki is clever.